Date yourself with a place you went to as a youth that no longer exists.

[Floyd R. Turbo]

BBF baby! 😋🍔🍟🥤

[markie]

1. I worked at a Burger Chef!

[griffi94]

7. I loved Burger Chef.

[Prof. Toru Tanaka]

12. We had two of them in our town growing up.

Their food was pretty good; I was sad to see them and Gino's Hamburgers go out of business.

[Floyd R. Turbo]

57. Remember it well! 😋🍔

[LakeArenal]

2. A drive-in movie.

Mr Lake worked there, too.

I can’t believe this place is still there.
Two-fer a quartrer a the time.

https://www.tuckershamburgers.com/

[Floyd R. Turbo]

61. Sweet!

[Arkansas Granny]

3. Tri-State Drive In Theater

?1401240548

[Floyd R. Turbo]

62. 😃

[Ocelot II]

4. The Cooper Theatre, Cinerama!

?1404015640

[Mister Ed]

15. Yes! With a 90-ft-wide Panavision scree n.

The last film I saw there before they tore it down was the Director's Edition of "Lawrence of Arabia". Indescribable!

[Ocelot II]

25. I saw "Windjammer" and "How The West Was Won"

in the original three-panel Cinerama. Which totally dates me... They were spectacular for the time (and as a little kid I was gobsmacked).

[Omaha Steve]

89. I was the Chairman of the group that tried to save the Indian Hills Theater!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Hills_Theater

Indian Hills Theater Preservation Society
Following the "Newstime" announcements, the Indian Hills Theater Preservation Society was founded with the goal of preserving the theater. Leaders of the Society were Steve Dawes, Ron A. Hunter, Tom Hunter, Frank Merwald and Susie Rose. The Society was assisted by letters of support to the local newspaper from film industry members such as Kirk Douglas, Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, Patricia Neal, Robert Wise, Richard D. Zanuck, and Ray Bradbury.[1] Bruce A. Crawford was largely responsible for facilitating the involvement of the Hollywood industry. Additionally, film historian Leonard Maltin appeared in a public-service commercial that aired on local television and radio in support of the Society. However, the CEO of Nebraska Methodist, Stephen Long, refused to discuss any alternative to immediate demolition.

[Ocelot II]

90. The Cooper was the same kind of theatre

and it was a blast. Thanks for trying; sadly, I think they are all gone now.

[Omaha Steve]

91. All three are gone

Denver, Minneapolis, and Omaha was the last.

[AllaN01Bear]

5. pacific ocean park. southern california.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Ocean_Park

[agingdem]

6. Pacific Ocean ParK (POP)

a two week Santa Monica family vacation with Mom and Dad...POP and the beach saved me from dying of boredom...

[quaint]

8. Nixon's Drive-in, Whittier Boulevard

[link:?w=500&h=312|

History There were picnic tables and a 31 Flavors in the back.
We always had fish and fries. Special treat away from Mom's canned salmon and crackers Friday dinners.

[hurl]

9. Aquarena Springs

https://texashillcountry.com/aquarena-springs-san-marcos-pictures/

[griffi94]

10. Astroworld

An amusement park in Houston across the freeway from the Astrodome.

[rownesheck]

33. That's what I was gonna say!

Guess now I'll add Sea-Arama that was in Galveston.

[griffi94]

43. Ha I went to Sea-Arama too

I'm gonna guess yer from Southeast Texas. Or, maybe western Louisianna.

[rownesheck]

46. Southeast Texas born and raised.

But have moved slightly west recently.

[griffi94]

55. I was born and raised in Livingston

In Polk County.
I moved east lol

[lark]

11. Riverview Roller Rink

Had so much fun there.

Oops - fixed the name of the place.

[EYESORE 9001]

13. Lazarus Department Store

[Floyd R. Turbo]

58. My home town.

[EYESORE 9001]

60. My adoptive home state

I’ve been here and there in Ohio for quite a few years now.

[Dream Girl]

14. Author Techers Fish and Chips

[EYESORE 9001]

17. Only one remains

In Cuyahoga Falls, OH. I ate there a couple years ago.
https://www.officialarthurtreachers.com/products

[Dream Girl]

29. I'm from Cleveland and we used to go there as a special treat.

[crosinski]

24. Yummy!

There was one in Muncie, In. back in the day.

[Rhiannon12866]

54. I used to go to the one in Saratoga Springs, NY, with my mother and grandmother

The last one I went to was in Albany, my favorite "fast food" place, wish there was still one around here.

[smirkymonkey]

79. Yes! I loved that place!

My Dad used to bring us there. That is where I first discovered the deliciousness of putting malt vinegar on my chips and have been a fan ever since! I was never really a big ketchup fan.

[Tikki]

16. BUSCH Gardens Van Nuys CA

No longer exists...But:

Good thing was it was near one of the Original Tommy's:


Thankfully...many TOMMY'S still exist...


Tikki

[Jeebo]

18. Segregated schools.

Whites-only drinking fountains and restrooms.

And rural antebellum churches. My father was a Southern Baptist preacher and in the middle and late 1950s and early 1960s he sometimes was the guest preacher at small country churches. So when I was 8, 10, 12 years old we would go to those tiny backwoods Alabama churches in places like Wetumpka and Marion Junction in buildings that had been there since before the Civil War. Those churches had slave lofts where slaves sat who went to church services with their white owners. The lofts were closed off and nobody ever went up there any more and nobody ever spoke of them, but everybody knew they were there and what they had been used for.

I don't know if those country churches are still there, but they had been there for more than a hundred years then, so maybe they're still there.

I grew up in the segregated South and I did not understand then what segregation was. It was just a part of the background I had always known. I was in my late teens and early 20s before I began to understand.

-- Ron

[-misanthroptimist]

19. Home

Seriously, we rented. Almost every place I lived prior to leaving home has been torn down, burned down, or fell into the swamp.

Oddly, all the businesses I used to frequent (and can remember) still seem to be operating.

[hedda_foil]

20. Riverview Amusement Park in Chicago

?w=420

[Mister Ed]

26. Yes! The parachute drop was terrifying to a 7-year-old.

I never did muster the nerve to ride "The Bobs" coaster.

[bahboo]

27. my Mom and sister got stuck at the top of the parachute ride...

took quite a while to get them down. Became part of family lore of course. And yep, The Bobs was a rite of passage back in the day...

[mopinko]

73. only went once, but big sisters went quite a few times.

i remember the baby roller coaster. the mouse something. something mouse.

[TlalocW]

21. Joyland Amusement Park - Wichita, KS

I remember the last time I went was in high school with my two best friends. As two of us were waiting for the third to bring in his bumper boat, a guy pulled himself out of the pool, pissed off and yelling, "MY BOAT SANK!" We went on another water ride - the Log Jam. At the end, your boat is carried up an inclined conveyor belt then you go down a hill of water. We were called over after our ride was done by the workers. We thought we were in trouble for rocking the boat or something. No. The cute girl in the booth at the top of the conveyor belt (who makes sure you're not doing anything stupid) had radio'ed down to get the phone number of the cute blonde guy (my friend - this was a common occurrence). Also that was the only time that I went on a roller coaster. There were no loops on it, but it was one of the scariest roller coasters in the country. If you watched it as others would ride it, you would see small pieces of the structure break off and fall. Everything was pretty much left to collapse and rot when it closed permanently. Louie, the robotic clown that "played" the Wurlitzer organ went missing sometime around the park's closing and was found in 2015 in the home of a sex offender who was in jail. That was actually a pretty big deal for people in Wichita. He apparently also stole the actual "organ" (keyboard, etc) and a sign, and that's been returned to the former owners of Joyland as well.





TlalocW

[Shrek]

75. First week of summer you could show up with your report card

The better your grades, the more free ride tickets you could get.

Your pic makes me sad. I remember when the Wacky Shack was first built and how popular it was.

Once I got older I spent more time at the go-kart track and the arcade.

[TlalocW]

77. I also remember

Blue plastic discs that came in some local chip brand (?). I may be wrong about the chips, but the disks were good for free rides. The Wacky Shack was iconic. It's the back cover photo for this book on abandoned amusement parks. It's a beautiful picture.

https://www.amazon.com/Abandoned-Hauntingly-Beautiful-Deserted-Theme/dp/1510723358

TlalocW

[Shrek]

81. Yes!

Sta Krisp chips. I remember going on a field trip to the chip factory in second grade.

Thanks for the memories; it’s been decades since I thought of any of this.

[TlalocW]

86. There's a pretty good chance

That somewhere in a box of stuff in storage, I have one of those discs.

TlalocW

[Niagara]

22. Fisher's Big Wheel department store.

[LizBeth]

23. bobs big boy

[Dream Girl]

31. Yum! Are they still around? I used to love theirBig Boy.

[LizBeth]

32. Not that I know of but my fav too. We went out so seldom and that was where we would go.

Loved their hamburger and shakes.

[Dream Girl]

35. Hot fudge sundaes and fries, good chili too. I went there during my college days.

[LizBeth]

41. Yes and yes and yes. The hot fudge sundaes.

[yellowdogintexas]

83. Not Bob's but Shoney's Big Boy is still around in Tennessee

Same fat little guy holding up the burger & wearing the red and white overalls

Strawberry Pie, for a treat at Shoney's - Shoney's Big Boy

We actually had 3 chains of Big Boy in KY and Tennessee

Shoney's, Jerry's and Frisch's Shoney's was in Tennessee, Jerry's was in Southern KY and Frisch's was in the Louisville area. Same menu same fat kid with the weird hair

[SouthernIrish]

28. The Land of Oz in North Carolina.

[Nittersing]

30. Palisades Amusement Park

[wnylib]

63. The one in the song?

[Nittersing]

65. The very same.

[electric_blue68]

67. We lived in Washington Heights near the GW Bridge so...

it was easy for us to drive to Palisades Park. 👍

[Runningdawg]

34. The County Fair

Sure it was kinda cheesy. But it had a few good rides and most of the good food the state fair had, just not as much of either. We went back 10 years ago. No rides, there was ONE popcorn/cotton candy stand ONE drink stand and ONE small buidling full of pre-teen 4-H exhibits. That was it. No talent contest, no hog calling or seed spitting, no tractor driving contest or turkey shoot, no livestock or auctions. Hell, they didn't even have rigged games or a t-shirt stand.

[MFM008]

36. Dog and Suds

A drive in burger joint in southern Illinois in the 60s.

[griffi94]

44. Is this the same place?

[IcyPeas]

37. New York World's Fair 1964-65

[csziggy]

49. My whole family and my husband's family went there - separately since we didn't know each other

We think it might have been the same year, too.

[electric_blue68]

85. Ah, my sister and I loved The World's Fair!

We went around 4-5 times each of the two summers.

Only the very last weekend I had sprained my ankle a couple of days earlier. My dad and sister went. I was soooo envious.

As a lover of architecture already the international pavilions with their cultural looks, and all the more modern, and futuristic ones just dazzled me! 🥰💖

And there was the water and colored lights show at night.

[berniesandersmittens]

38. Dogpatch USA

It shut down when I was a teenager. Fun for us local kid hillbillies.

[griffi94]

45. I grew up near Houston

We went to Dogpatch USA on vacation one year.
I remember there was a band playing semi-current hits on one of the live stages.
Great time.

[Corgigal]

39. Catskills Game Farm.

Lots of us still miss it.

[Doc_Technical]

40. Frontier Village amusement park, San Jose CA

Went there many times. I lived about a mile away from it.

[Fla Dem]

42. Pleasure Island Wakefield, Ma. Was supposed to be the East Coast Disney Land

[csziggy]

47. The Great Masterpiece aka Masterpiece Gardens

http://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/159666

The Story was certainly dramatic enough. A large mosaic, "The Great Masterpiece," faithfully reproducing da Vinci's famous "Last Supper" painting, had to be smuggled out of Europe under wraps in order to save it from the advancing, art stealing, Nazis.

It found a home in a peaceful garden just north of Lake Wales, off of US 27, where viewings were held for the contemplation and inspiration of the faithful.

But by the 1960's, inspiration just wasn't enough. Amusement was added, in the form of animal shows, a train ride, and sky ride. The park's name was changed to Masterpiece Gardens to reflect the expansion, but it was still unsuccessful.

Today the former attraction has become an Assemblies of God church camp. The rides and animals are gone, and the mosaic has also finally been sold and removed.

http://lostparks.com/mastgard.html

We never went to it once it became Masterpiece Gardens. I remember going once or twice to see the mosaic which was pretty cool. Somewhere I have a picture of my two older sister and me in front of the original sign for the attraction, but I don't have it online yet.

[mia]

48. Glen Echo Amusement Park (Maryland)

The last time I was there was in 1962.

[ironflange]

50. Expo '67

[rurallib]

51. Woolworth's 5 and dime - and Kresge's

We also has Scott's in our downtown

[wnylib]

64. Also, Grant's and Murphy's.

We had all the "five and dime" stores in the downtown section of my home town, Erie, PA. Downtown then had everything - the five and dimes, Sears, Penney's, a 6 story local "dry goods" department store, high end department stores, shoe stores, jewelry stores, grand movie theaters with heavy drapes over the screen, hardware stores, leather goods stores, small boutique clothing stores, fine restaurants.

When I was a child, we had one car, which my father took to work. My mother would take me downtown on a bus with her to spend a day shopping. After shopping at department stores and shoe stores, we would go to the lunch counter at one of the five and dimes for hot dogs or hamburgers and fries. I was allowed either a sundae or ice cream soda for dessert.

Then more shopping and a bus ride home with boxes tied with strings and large paper shopping bags with handles, full of smaller bags and boxes.

[rurallib]

66. sounds familiar

[DashOneBravo]

52. West Germany

[Glorfindel]

53. Loew's Grand Theatre, Atlanta, GA

Back when going to the theater was an event.

[jmowreader]

56. The Berlin Wall

I was in my 20s then and now I'm about to turn 58, so I say that counts.

My fourth assignment was to Berlin, Germany. I landed in Berlin on Veteran's Day 1986, which probably pissed the first sergeant off a bit since he had to come in on a national holiday to assign me a room. I liked it there so much I reenlisted for six years current station, which would have meant I'd be in Berlin nine years. The day I was supposed to return to the US if I hadn't reenlisted was also the day the Wall opened up, so if I'd have landed in New York and found out the Wall was open, I'd have probably gotten back on the plane and gone back to Berlin.

And while I was there I became so useful to so many people the colonel started a joke, "they're going to have to close the Field Station before they'll let you leave." It turns out that's exactly what did happen.

[Wolf Frankula]

59. Comiskey Park

Wolf

[electric_blue68]

68. Freedom Land in The Bronx...

where Co-op City now occupies.

A short lived Amusement Park about The USA.

Really.

[Hobo]

69. Aquarama

South Philadelphia close to where the stadiums are now.

Hobo

[Kaleva]

70. A dairy farm in my local tri-county area.

[Kaleva]

71. An outhouse at a local church.

[Demovictory9]

72. Lerner's Department stores

[mopinko]

74. early jobs- tijiauna taco, playback and just pants.

in the historic northgate shopping mall in aurora, il.
one of the 1st. still there but lots of vacancies.

[Brother Buzz]

76. Seals Stadium

The smell of yeast in the air was magical. There was a brewery and a bakery across the streets, so I'm not certain which one, or even a combination of both that produced it, but it was totally magical.

[CountAllVotes]

78. Mirror Lake in Yosemite National Park

Its gone and it ain't comin' back!

[Generic Brad]

80. Sandy's

https://www.flickr.com/photos/smokey2006/3432348072

The one in my home town became a Hardee's. But Hardee's was never as tasty as Sandy's was.

[yellowdogintexas]

82. Tastee Treat in Russelville KY

the burgers were loose meat style and so darn good. THey also had the best soft serve I have ever eaten.

The little burger bags had a map that showed their other locations, which were in Nebraska and Iowa; ;maybe northern Kansas, with a big arrow pointing down to Russellville.

Fort Campbell is not far away; we always figured either a soldier from Nebraska was stationed there & married a local woman OR a local KY soldier was stationed in Nebraska and married one of their locals and moved back to KY, bringing Tastee back with him.

It is long gone but was a huge part of my childhood and teen years.

[whistler162]

84. Roseland Amusement Park

Born and raised for a few years in Canadaigua. Got my start in a funeral home.

[GReedDiamond]

87. Smokin' US 30 Dragstrip...

I went there a few times in the 60s.

At least one of those times was along with the driver/crew of the Hurst Hemi Under Glass.

[kairos12]

88. The Pyramids